[MD] economics-platt

[John Carl]

Platt and Adrie,

That whole post WWII, cold war build up was a weird thing.  Very Orwellian
pattern of enemy formation, if you ask me.  Would Russia have dominated
Europe without US intervention?  I very much doubt it.  Russia's build up
was a natural reaction to a giant country being invaded about every 40 years
and the attempt to hold a fragile empire together.

But since they had this huge military, WE had to have a huge military, and
since we had the bomb, THEY had to have the bomb, and the whole thing kept
ramping up out of control.  Very much as Royce describes, the problems with
a dangerous dyad.

An astute economic guy on our local scene, Marc Cuniberti commented this
week that we should never underestimate the urge of military spending toward
getting huge and exciting toys.  Standing at the helm of a carrier battle
group with all those missles bristling and jets zooming is probably the
biggest macho rush known to man.  But after all that money has been spent,
what good has actually been produced?

Besides for a small group of boys playing war games, I mean.

John the retro-peacenik

On Sat, Jun 5, 2010 at 6:41 AM, Platt Holden <plattholden at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Fri, Jun 4, 2010 at 5:57 PM, Fam. Kintziger-Karaca <
> kintziger_karaca at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Hi Platt
> > With so many of the electorate now feeding at the government trough, it's
> > doubtful if America's headlong rush to be like Europe can be averted.
> And,
> > the
> > economic problems of Europe will soon become multiplied tenfold in the
> U.S.
> > Western civilization will gradually wither away to be replaced by the
> > growing
> > Asian giants. As we speak, China can plunge America into the abyss by
> > demanding
> > payment of U.S. debt.
> >
> > China can plunge.....
> > its a pattern that is very well known here , it happens in Europe all the
> > time
> > France can plunge Portugal, Belgium can plunce Holland, Germany can
> plunge
> > greece....etc
> >
> > I'm not very sure of what i'm reading about the American perception
> towards
> > Europe's
> > economical problems, is the perception in the US that our problems are ,
> in
> > fact bigger than the
> > US -economical problems?
> > The perception here is that America is in bigger trouble--
> >
> > Hi Adrie,
>
> I think the perception there is correct, although both Europe and the U.S.
> are headed down the road to ruin.
>
>
>
> > I think (personally) that the dicision to stay militarised after WW2, is
> > showing the paycheck now..
> > Europe invested in healthcare what America invested in military assets.
> > Healthcare is the golden egg here.
> >
>
> Yes, U.S. bailed out Europe from the devastation of WWII and then provided
> a
> military umbrella against the communist threat, allowing Europeans to
> create
> their cradle-to-grave welfare culture. Now the chickens are coming home to
> roost on both continents.
>
> Regards,
> Platt
>
>
>
> >
> >
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